"It was clear from the outset that a death sentence would be pronounced against me, as I have always regarded the trial as a purely political act by the victors, but I wanted to see this trial through for my people's sake and I did at least expect that I should not be denied a soldier's death. Before God, my country, and my conscience I feel myself free of the blame that an enemy tribunal has attached to me."

"This kangaroo court at Nuremburg was officially known as the 'InternationalMilitary Tribunal.' That name is a libel on the military profession. The tribunal was not a military one in any sense. The only military men among the judges were the Russians.... At Nuremberg, mankind and our present civilization were on trial, with men whose own hands were bloody sitting on the judges' seats. One of the judges came from the country which committedthe Katyn Forest massacre and produced an array of witnesses to swear atNuremberg that the Germans had done it."

"I may, and do, say that I have always regarded the Nuremberg prosecutions as a step backward in international law, and a precedent that will prove embarrassing, if not disastrous, in the future."

Honorable Justice Learned HandThompson, and Strutz ed., p. 1.

"The Nuremberg Trials... had been popular throughout the world and particularly in the United States. Equally popular was the sentence already announced by the high tribunal: death. But what kind of trial was this? ...The Constitution was not a collection of loosely given political promises subject to broad interpretation. It was not a list of pleasing platitudes to be set lightly aside when expediency required it. It was the foundation of the American system of law and justice and [Robert Taft] was repelled by the picture of his country discarding those Constitutional precepts in order to punish a vanquished enemy."

U.S. President, John F. Kennedy John Kennedy, Profiles in Courage p.189-190.

"I could never accept the Nuremberg Trials as representing a fair and just procedure."

Dr. Igor I. SikorskyThompson, and Strutz ed., p.3.

"I have always regarded the Nuremberg Trials as a travesty upon justice andthe farce was made even more noisome with Russia partipating as one of thejudges."

Charles Callan Tansill, Ph.D.Thompson, and Strutz ed., p. 47.

"My conclusion is that the entire program of War Crimes Trials, either by International Courts, the members of which comprise those of the victorious nations, or by Military Courts of a single victor nation is basically without legal or moral authority... The fact remains that the victor nations in WorldWar II, while still at fever heat of hatred for an enemy nation, found patriots of the enemy nation guilty for doing their patriotic duty. This is patently unlawful and immoral. One of the most shameful incidents connected with the War Crimes Trials prosecutions has to do with the investigations and the preparation of the cases for trial. The records of trials which our Commission examined disclosed that a great majority of the official investigators, employed by the United States Government to secure evidence and to locate defendants, were persons with a preconceived dislike for these enemy aliens, and their conduct was such that they resorted to a number of illegal, unfair, and cruel methods and duress to secure confessions of guilt and to secure accusations by defendants against other defendants. In fact, in the Malmedy case, the only evidence before the court, upon which the convictions and sentences were based, consisted of the statements and testimony of the defendants themselves. The testimony of one defendant against another was secured by subterfuge, false promises of immunity, and by mock trials and threats."

The Tribunal claimed in theory the right -- it certainly had the power --to declare any act a war-crime. But it interpreted Article 6 of the Charter creating it, as excluding from its consideration any act committed by the victorious powers. As a consequence any act proved to have been committedby the victorious powers could not be declared by the Tribunal a war-crime. For this reason, the indiscriminate bombing of civilians which had indisputably been initiated by Great Britain was excluded from consideration as a war crime by the Tribunal."

They serve, above all, the purpose of engraining in the German people a consciousness of collective guilt, so that its sons and daughters would be born already burdened with the German "Original Sin."

And: [...]Although I am Jewish it is horrible for me to watch these trials, to see how a good, industrious people with masochistic blissfulness commits physical, mental and spiritual harakiri [...] These war crime trials will not be honorable to the German people. The hanging of the condemmed at the Nuremberg Military Tribunals should have put a final stroke under the sad chapter. The victorious powers were shortsighted and ill advised when they imposed on the the German people these ghastly spectacles, because under the general contract the German government was dictated to the continuation of these so called war crime trials. Germans shall sit on judgement against Germans in this unworthy form. That is no search for justice but, since long proven, an anti-German policy.[...]

The presiding judge in Case 7 (trial of German generals for alleged wholesale murder of hostages), Charles F. Wennerstrum, spoke out publicly and forcefully immediately after sentences had been pronounced:[44]

"If I had known seven months ago what I know today, I would never have come here. Obviously, the victor in any war is not the best judge of the war crime guilt. Try as you will, it is impossible to convey to the defense, their counsel, and their people that the court is trying to represent all mankind rather than the country which appointed its members. What I have said of the nationalist character of the tribunals applies to the prosecution. The high ideal announced as the motives for creating these tribunals has not been evident. The prosecution has failed to maintain objectivity aloof from vindictiveness, aloof from personal ambitions for convictions. It has failed to strive to lay down precedents which might help the world to avoid future wars. The entire atmosphere here is unwholesome. Linguists were needed. The Americans are notably poor linguists. Lawyers, clerks, interpreters and researchers were employed who became Americans only in recent years, whose backgrounds were imbedded in Europe's hatreds and prejudices. The trials were to have convinced the Germans of the guilt of their leaders. They convinced the Germans merely that their leaders lost the war to tough conquerors. Most of the evidence in the trials was documentary, selected from the large tonnage of captured records. The selection was made by the prosecution. The defense had access only to those documents which the prosecution considered material to the case. Our tribunal introduced a rule of procedure that when the prosecution introduced an excerpt from a document, the entire document should be made available to the defense for presentation as evidence. The prosecution protested vigorously. General Taylor tried out of court to call a meeting of the presiding judges to rescind this order. It was not the attitude of any conscientious officer of the court seeking full justice. Also abhorrent to the American sense of justice is the prosecution's reliance upon self-incriminating statements made by the defendants while prisoners for more than two and a half years, and repeated interrogation without presence of counsel. Two and one-half years of confinement is a form of duress in itself. The lack of appeal leaves me with a feeling that justice has been denied. [...] You should go to Nuremberg. You would see there a palace of justice where 90 per cent of the people are interested in prosecution. [...] The German people should receive more information about the trials and the German defendants should receive the right to appeal to the United Nations."

As a representative of the American people I desire to say that what is taking place in Nuremberg, Germany, is a disgrace to the United States... A racial minority, two and a half years after the war closed, are in Nuremberg not only hanging German soldiers but trying German businessmen in the name of the United States.

"I think the Nuremberg trials are a black page in the history of the world ... I discussed the legality of these trials with some of the lawyers and some of the judges who participated therein. They did not attempt to justify their action on any legal ground, but rested their position on the fact that in their opinion, the parties convicted were guilty...This action is contrary to the fundamental laws under which this country has lived for many hundreds of years, and I think cannot be justified by any line of reasoning. I think the Israeli trial of Adolf Eichmann is exactly in the same category as the Nuremberg trials. As a lawyer, it has always been my view that a crime must be defined before you can be guilty of committing it. That has not occurred in either of the trials I refer to herein."

Edgar N. Eisenhower, American Attorney, brother of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. In Thompson, and Strutz ed., Doenitz at Nuremberg: A Re-appraisal, p.168.